Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine, September-October 2021

Description

September-October 2021. What loyalty do you owe and to whom? Family, friends, neighbors, community, society? Many of the stories in this issue explore the complicated demands of these bonds of blood and affection. In our cover story, “Glass” by James R. Benn, an uncle and nephew find their loyalty tested when an unlikely stroke of luck hands them the means to wealth and success. In R. T. Lawton’s “Gnawing at the Cat’s Tail,” the young son of a warlord in the opium trade survives internecine conflict with the aid of an unlikely ally. A teacher’s summer work operating an ice-cream truck draws unwanted attention from her landlord in “Ice Ice Baby,” by Barb Goffman. In “Blindsided,” cowritten by Michael Bracken and James A. Hearn, a college football player must question his loyalty to a teammate. During the Vietnam War, a sergeant stands up for his colonel when the officer is accused of murder in “Raining” by Peter Colt. In Robert Lopresti’s “Taxonomy Lesson,” an academic dalliance goes off the tracks at an important conference. Set among the Haliwa community of North Carolina, a white writer opens up old wounds when he tries to track down a womanizer from the fifties in “Ju Ju” by L. A. Wilson, Jr. Also in this issue, “No God West of Hays,” by Eric Ruark, John C. Boland’s “Paris Green”, Wayne J. Gardiner's “A Hell of a Thing . . .”, “The Shoemaker’s Children” by Tom Savage, “The Map Dot Murder” by Mark Thielman, and finally we welcome Floyd Sullivan in this issue with “The Beano.” Lee Lofland explains the complexities of grand juries in his Case Files column. Plus book reviews, puzzles, and more!